[lbo-talk] Re: dean and rebel flags

[Wojtek Sokolowski]

Doug:
> No kidding. I find it very hard to believe that anyone doesn't
> realize that black people read it as such, as do antiracist nonblack
> people. Especially after all those public fights about the meaning of
> the thing on all those state flags. But the convenient thing about it
> is you can pretend it's not racist - so you get to have it both ways.
> 

Is that a "tongue in cheek" or what?  As a long-standing admirer of pop
culture, would not you know that symbols are often accepted for their
shock value and do not signify any allegiance to the ideology that once
created them?  Thus, Black rappers calling themselves and other Blacks
"niggas," or assorted punks displaying hammer and sickle or a swastika
does not mean that these folks subscribe to racism, communism or Nazism.
It simply a way of saying "fuck you" to the mainstream society that
finds these symbols offensive.  Ditto for the confederate flag or, for
that matter, using the f-word in every line of the lyrics.  

Wojtek